Ghost Writer
by Maurever
Summary: "I hate to use such a hackneyed phrase, but by the time anyone reads this I will likely be dead." What nobody knew was that he wrote it at the asking of somebody dead. No Pairings


Houses are not haunted. _We_ are haunted, and regardless of the architecture with which we surround ourselves, our ghosts stay with us until we ourselves are ghosts.

- Dean Koontz

It had only seemed natural, really, coming to Los Angeles. It was America, where he had been born - it was a big crime center, which meant he had a good chance of getting support in his struggle - and somehow it had just felt right, concocting his plan to surpass Near in the same place B, his beloved sempai, had plotted to surpass L.

"And didn't really fail," he murmured to himself as he stared out at the city-brightened night, ignoring the strange looks he was getting from the Mafia men. "Didn't really succeed, either. Is that why, I wonder?"

"Why what?" Rod Ross asked. Mello could tell from his tone that he was thinking his advisor was crazy again; Mello shrugged his thin shoulders. He could live with that. B lived with that.

"Nothing." He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, smiling as through the haze of smoke and chocolate he caught the faintest scent of strawberry.

"I think he's a bit off his rocker, boss," he heard one of the men mutter behind him.

"I don't care, as long as he does his job," Ross replied coolly.

Maybe he was insane. Maybe it was crazy to walk through day-to-day life without showing a speck of real emotion, calmly ordering and directing things that inside he was screaming in anger and disgust at. To keep an off-kilter smile as his default expression and wake up in the night to find tears pouring down his face. He didn't care anymore.

He wasn't going to be second best. He wasn't going to be used by anyone. He wasn't going to lose. Wasn't-wasn't-wasn't, until he could barely remember what he was going to do, and sometimes he wanted to give up. "But I won't," he said, half to himself as he wandered down a dark alley towards an appointment. "Especially not with him watching."

Was it he who was haunted, he wondered, or was it the whole city where B had staged his last and greatest work, painting a message to L in letters of blood across Los Angeles?

"The City of Angels, huh? City of Ghosts would be more like it."

"Mello. Keep your mind on the job."

"Yes, Rod…"

It was probably he who was haunted, he considered; not that he expected B to prefer haunting Wammy's, where A had been lost and he had first been accused for murder, but…

"B-sempai never believed in ghosts," he told the couch. He liked the couch; it was soft and always there and the black and white stripes reminded him of Matt. "It's funny that he's one now."

Mostly the others didn't speak to him now except when necessary; he was glad of that. It gave him more time to just sit quiet, eyes closed and senses tense and expectant, until he caught the familiar strawberry scent. If he really listened hard, sometimes he thought he heard familiar anime theme songs being faintly hummed, and on rare occasions he'd hear a whisper… He could never make out the words, but it gave him new energy.

Then one night, as he sat looking out the large window and trying to ignore the loud laughter and talk of the other people in the room, he heard him clearly.

"Mello."

He nearly fell from his precarious perch on the windowsill and wildly looked around. Rather ridiculous of him, though; that soft, Japanese-accented voice could belong to only one person.

"Mello."

"What? Where?" Ignoring the sideways glances and looks of half-annoyance, half-fear he was getting, the leather-clad teen raced to the door and strained to listen. Now that he had heard his sempai clearly, the thought that he would lose that faint voice seemed unbearable. "B! B-sempai!"

"Mello."

He ignored Rod, who had called after him, and raced down the hall after the faint voice. He was brought to a halt at the end of the hall, faced with three doors. "Which way?" he begged of thin air.

"Mello!"

The stairs! He wrenched open the door and took them two at a time until he stood on the roof, his hair being whipped by the night wind that slightly relieved the August heat.

"Mello."

The voice was clearer now. "What is it, sempai?" he asked more calmly. "What do you want?"

The scent of strawberry led him to the railing, where he looked out over the whole city. It occurred to him that from here he could probably see from here all the places B had been in the city.

"Mello…"

"Yes?" he whispered, straining his hearing.

"Write!"

The last word was loud and clear, and Mello understood in a second. A grin breaking across his face, he nodded. "I will, B-sempai."

He turned, looking over the empty roof. "I'll write your story. Nobody will ever forget you."

It had never been touch before, but he almost thought he felt a light brush of a hand on his shoulder, a tap of approval. That was all he needed.

"According to the reports we've found," Hal Bullock told Near, many years later, "when he was writing the book we found in his rooms he just locked himself up and wouldn't speak to anyone. They heard him talking to someone that only he could hear and see."

"He sounds like he was crazy," Rester commented.

Quietly, Near picked up one of his least-used puppets - a tiny figure with messy dark hair and a knowing smirk - and set it next to a puppet with a rosary around its neck and golden hair.

"No," he said, matter-of-factly. "I think he was haunted."


End file.
